at least was its original import,) is derived from the swarming of
bees, namely, schwaermen, schwaermerey. The passion being in an
inverse proportion to the insight,--that the more vivid, as this the
less distinct--anger is the inevitable consequence. The absense of all
foundation within their own minds for that, which they yet believe
both true and indispensable to their safety and happiness, cannot but
produce an uneasy state of feeling, an involuntary sense of fear from
which nature has no means of rescuing herself but by anger. Experience
informs us that the first defence of weak minds is to recriminate.

There's no philosopher but sees,
That rage and fear are one disease;
Tho' that may burn, and this may freeze,
They're both alike the ague.

But where the ideas are vivid, and there exists an endless power of
combining and modifying them, the feelings and affections blend more
easily and intimately with these ideal creations than with the objects
of the senses; the mind is affected by thoughts, rather than by
things; and only then feels the requisite interest even for the most
important events and accidents, when by means of meditation they have
passed into thoughts. The sanity of the mind is between superstition
with fanaticism on the one hand, and enthusiasm with indifference and
a diseased slowness to action on the other. For the conceptions of the
mind may be so vivid and adequate, as to preclude that impulse to the
realizing of them, which is strongest and most restless in those, who
possess more than mere talent, (or the faculty of appropriating and
applying the knowledge of others,)--yet still want something of the
creative and self-sufficing power of absolute genius. For this reason
therefore, they are men of commanding genius. While the former rest